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Saturday, November 27, 2010

Alpha 5 release!

This time it's true.
Get it on the download page.
If you want to unlock all the reincarnation madness go to the options in game.

ALPHA 5 CHANGES
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Two new HUGE features : undead mode and reincarnation.
You can use or abuse the reincarnation feature... or not. Its up to you.
There are also some modifications to gameplay, balance and AI.

FIXED BUGS
- Subway small maintenance room will not overlap platform anymore.
- Post-mortem option "simulate when sleeping" shows properly.
- Attacker icon won't display in odd places when the attacker is out of map (eg: zombie bashing from another map).
- Long names in HiScore table are now truncated.
- Actors who can't talk cannot shout either (eg: undeads).

GAMEPLAY
New : Play as an Undead!
- Choose your race from Skeleton to Zombie Master.
- All undead rules apply to you, so know your abilities and limitations.
- You can see living and zombie masters scents - if ability.
- Scoring comes mostly from killing, no achievement to reach.
- Difficulty rating as undead is opposite to difficulty as survivor.
- No access to the city map.
- Does not get notified of events.
New : Reincarnate!
- When your current character dies you get the choice to reincarnate or not, if the option is activated.
- Continue playing in the game world as you left it.
- After dying you can choose between different reincarnations avatars :
- Random Actor.
- Random Living.
- Random Undead.
- Random Follower (of yours).
- Your Killer.
- Your Zombified Self.
- You loose everything related to your previous character (scoring, memory etc...).
- Reincarnation as living can be limited to civilians only (an option, on by default).
- Reincarnation as undead can exclude zombie rats (an option, on by default).
- Reincarnation can exclude avatars in the sewers (an option, on by default).
- Some rare reincarnation unique places or actors are forbidden.
- Difficulty value for scoring is divided by each successive reincarnation.
Map Objects
- Iron Gates (subway, hospital, prison) are now breakable but are very resistant.
- Large fortifications are now opaque.
Trading
- Followers are always willing to trade with their leader, even uninteresting or silly deals.
- Gangs can trade with friends.
Leading
- Relaxed faction leadership restrictions a bit, so civilians can be lead by anyone friendly (eg: civilians led by cops or army).
Items
- Item batteries duration and stench killer capacity increased.
Ligthing
- Flashlights improves FoV only if it is dark (in other words, they are useless during the day).
Map Generation
- Shops might have a window.
- No zombie start in the subway.
Event
- Zombies do not spawn in subway anymore.
Zombification
- Zombifieds keep one level of a random skill of their ex-living form - skill which might now be useless to them.
Actors
- Undeads may stumble while jumping and loose action points (eg: ZMs).
- Rats have the "Small" ability which allows them to slip through any objects except closed doors.
Pushing
- Pushing is a loud noise.

INTERFACE & MANUAL
- Undead : view scents.
- Undead : status line show "Field Of Smelling" range (FoS).
- UI does not display stats irrelevant to your current avatar (eg: food for zombies).
- Reincarnation screens.
- Leaders have a "L" icon.
- NPC/objects in action messages will show up as "someone/something" if when not visible to the player.
- Refugees and Midnight Invasion event won't pause the game anymore - this get annoying after a while.
- Updated the manual.

OPTIONS
- Difficulty : Show separate difficulty for undead mode.
- New option : Max number of reincarnations allowed (1 by default).
- New option : Allow to reincarnate as zombie rat or not - as they are numerous and quite boring to play (no by default).
- New option : Allow to reincarnate to the sewers or not (no by default).
- New option : Restrict livings reincarnation to civilians (yes by default) - some actors like char guards are not meant to be played, but can be fun
- New option : Permadeath - delete saved game on death, doubles difficulty rating (off by default).
- New option : Death Screenshot - automatically takes a screenshot of your death (on by default).
- Default Zombification up to 100% (was 80%).
- Default Max Undeads up to 100 (was 90).

AI
- Followers : when Guarding or Patroling, mimick leader cellphone usage.
- CivilianAI : desperate starving civilians will push objects around and attack barricades in the hope of finding hidden stashes of food.
- CivilianAI : now interested in stench killers and will use them.
- ZombieAI : reordered behaviors to give more priority to following ZM.
- ZombieAI : ZMs and evolved Zombifieds can and will push objects in various situations.
- ZombieAI : do not attack objects and barricades on sight anymore.
- Soldiers & Civilians will now build large fortifications too.
- Tuned Fleeing logic.
- Updated living AIs to handle being led by the player.

KNOWN BUGS AND GLITCHES
- Asymetric FoV.

A NOTE ON REINCARNATION
Playing as a civilian survivor is still the main focus of the game.
If you play a non-civilian leader, keep in mind non civilians-AI are pretty much limited.
Some living actors do not need to eat, but most have to sleep.
The ability the play other actors has been tested but is not guaranted to work 100% fine yet.
Feel free to report any bug or oddity you might find when playing a non-civilian.
With all this being said...

a bug i've noticed is if a person dies on top of a car, they cannot move out of that space as a zombie. I got randomly reincarnated to a zombie woman stuck on top of a car. All i can do is wait and hope someone either stands next to me or puts me out of my misery